One Wrong Move
by lucky97mary
Summary: The leaders of the Rebellion decided that Peeta would better connect with the people of Panem, so when the time came and only one of the star-crossed lovers could be saved, Peeta was the one taken back to District 13. Katniss is taken to the Capitol and hijacked in the place of Peeta. Will they ever be able to heal?
1. Confusion

**Hi reader! I had this story rattling around in my head for a few days and figured I'd type it up. I'm not sure if I'm going to continue it, so if you think I should I hope you'll leave a review! **

I stared blankly into the corner of the completely white room. Well, I thought it was the corner, but everything looks the same in this room. This alone is enough to make me crazy, as I spend nearly all of my time here.

But I was already crazy, white walls or no white walls.

I closed my eyes and tried to see something else, anything else. But my body ached, and the cut left across my temple by a guard is still bleeding, the red droplets sliding agonizingly slowly down my cheek, and I couldn't leave this place, not even in my head.

I wished so badly that I could just reach up and wipe the blood away, but my hands were secured with rusty restraints to a chair which was, unsurprisingly, white. Instead, I just looked down at the only non-white things in the room: my body and clothes, and the restraints on my wrists, ankles, and across my abdomen.

As usual, I examined the black thread that held together my clothes. They had dressed me in the same clothes that the tributes had worn during my first Games.

How fitting.

By now, though, the clothes were blood spattered and torn in several places. I suppose they were that way in the Games as well.

Voices start to ring in my head, a million of them. I can only pick out a few: the lethal voice of Cato, the nauseating screams of Rue, the strong call of Gale, the steady shout of Peeta, the sweet croon of Prim. The voices get louder and louder, completely uncontrollable until my ear drums are screaming and my head pounding.

I thrash around, trying so hard to get it to stop, if only just for a moment. The rusted restraints tear at my wrists, but I can't bring myself to care. The voices blend together, still louder, always louder, until I realize that they're not inside my head.

They're being fed into this damn room from some outside source, some sort of yet another sick joke being played by the Capitol. I stop my thrashing and the screeches that had unconsciously been flying out of my mouth. I force myself to take a deep breath; they want a reaction. Every inch of this place is covered in video cameras, I know that much.

All they want is some sort of reaction.

I will not give them even that much.

So I level my gaze to the wall in front of me, and the white walls suddenly seem blindingly bright. But I ignore it, and the voices, as the best I can. Eventually, after some immeasurable amount of time, they stop. The silence leaves my ears ringing, but I ignore that too.

I cannot feel, I cannot hope.

Those are the things that will destroy me.

The lights in the room go out then, and I'm left blinking through the thick black that the light leaves behind. I close my eyes, because I know that it's the easiest way to pretend that it isn't that dark at all, that I'm simply waiting for sleep to find me.

I start going through what has become my routine of sorts to keep my body functioning. I tense the muscles in my calves until they shake and cramp up, and then tighten those in my thighs until they do the same. Slowly but surely, I move my way up my body with this process, and then move back down.

It's not much, but it's all I've got.

It's only with my body functioning that I could hope for an escape.

When I'm finished, I let my body relax, exhausted even by such small amounts of physical exertion. I can't recall the last time I've eaten, though I can't exactly tell time very well in here anyway. There's no sunlight to tell me what time of day or night it is, a fact I try to ignore. I'm trying to keep my mind intact as much as possible. I know exactly what Snow is doing to me now: keeping me alive, but just barely.

He's letting the world watch the Mockingjay deteriorate, physically and mentally.

There's just one reason why I know that the Mockingjay is who I was meant to be: Snow told me of it himself. Capitol spies had managed to discover the plans to make me into the face of the Rebellion.

But they had taken Peeta instead.

For this I was grateful; my Boy with the Bread was somewhere safe, and I was more than willing to be here in his place.

After what seems like quite some time, the blood on my temple dries and I drop off to a fitful sleep. This is interrupted by my own screams from the ever-present nightmares, and followed by the opening of the door in front of me. It looks rather strange to see it open, considering I assumed it to be part of wall.

Regardless, light spills into the room around a dark figure that approaches me at a stiff walk. I shy away on instinct, but I can't move very far. The person, whoever it is, unlocks all of my restraints, but not before securing a silver metal band around my ankle.

As if I knew my way out of here anyway.

He pushes me in front of him, and I can feel the unmistakable sensation of a gun poking into my spine. One wrong move and I'm dead.

He nudges me along through the labyrinth of halls, all completely white. I see only two other people, and sight of one nearly breaks my heart. It's the girl I've come to know as Annie prodded along by another guard. In the split second ours eyes meet, I can see that she has gone through far more than I have. Her eyes are wide with fear, and her entire body is shaking. I think I manage some look of reassurance, but I can't be sure. Either way, she's gone in just a moment, shoved through one of the countless doors that line the halls.

Almost immediately after Annie disappears, I leave the hall as well. I find myself in another white room, but the focal point here is a metal table. The guard motions towards it, but when I don't move, he calls out for other guards. I panic internally, but don't show it on my face.

They file in, pick me up, and toss me onto the table with enough force to bruise my shoulder blades. Before I know it, I'm strapped down, unable to move at all. One man in a lab coat shuffles in, a syringe in his hand.

"What is that?!" I demand, unable to keep my voice from rising in panic. "Tell me what that is!"

He proceeds as if he hasn't heard me at all, yanking my sleeve up and plunging the needle into the soft skin inside my elbow. After having experienced so much pain while being captured, I don't even flinch at puncture of my skin.

That is, until white hot, scalding pain spreads through my veins. I scream, writing around, unable to stop my reactions. My mind swirls until suddenly one memory is brought to the front of my thoughts. I watch Peeta shove me away, and run in the other direction, the second arena the backdrop to the memory.

Is that what happened when the roof got blown off the arena?

I couldn't remember. I hadn't been able to remember.

Until now.

How could he?

**So as I said before, if you think this story is worth continuing, I'd love for you to leave a review : )**

**Thanks for reading!**


	2. Darkness

Peeta's POV:

"Easy there, kid." I can't seem to place the source of the words, but I can feel two hands pushing down on my shoulders.

Confused, I wrench my eyes open, my lids seeming heavy and unrelenting. The room around me comes into focus slowly, shifting and spinning for a few moments. I can see a white and gray room, sterile and cold looking.

Then there's a face that seems vaguely familiar staring at me from only a few feet away. There's someone else standing in the corner, a man who I swear I know from somewhere. The third person in the room, however, I have never encountered before.

"Peeta? How are you feeling?"

I blink stupidly for just one moment more before it all comes rushing back, and I sit up with a start. Instantly the same hands are pushing me back against a pillow, though more carefully this time.

"Haymitch?" I ask, the word coming out garbled. The woman who I didn't recognize hustles towards me, dressed completely in gray, a syringe filled with a thick bronze colored liquid in her hand.

But Haymitch waves her off, never looking away from me. I can't figure out why he's looking at me like this, like I'm about to run out of the room screaming at any moment. The woman shuffles out of the room then, the door closing behind her.

"What's going on?" I ask, the words sounding only slightly clearer.

"How are you feeling?" he insists, refusing to answer my question.

"Fine, fine." My attempt at patronizing him doesn't seem to work, and he gives me a frustrated expression before blowing out a huge breathe and running a hand through his hair.

"No, Peeta. How do you feel?"

"I don't know…fine? My head hurts a little I guess…what happened?"

The last bit I can recall is the flash of light from the lighting in the arena and then everything was flying, everyone being lifted off their feet, but then the memories ended there.

"They blew the top of the arena, and we picked you up. You're in District 13—,"

But I cut him off there, though my curiosity burns at our location.

"Wait, where's Katniss?!" Something has set me off, and I know Haymitch is hiding something from me. And Katniss isn't here…the panic rises up in my chest. I try to remember where I last saw her in the arena, but things are still fuzzy.

He stops short, looking warily at me. I swing my legs over the side of the bed to go in search of some answers, but that's when the man who had been standing in the corner starts to move.

He crosses the room in just a few long strides, and at last I recognize him as Finnick Odair, Capitol favorite and ally from the Quell. He looks far older than he did just a few days ago…or has it been longer? I can't tell, and at the moment I really don't care.

"Peeta," he says, his voice a half-hearted attempt at soothing, "you need to relax right now."

"Just tell me where she is." My own voice is low and threatening, and there's no trace of confusion and garbling in it now. If they won't tell me, then things must be really bad.

"Please Peeta, just sit back down."

I won't do what he asks, nor do I have time to. Before I can work up a response, the woman, who is clearly a nurse of some sort, returns to my side and plunges the needle into my arm without a word.

The anger at her flares up, fast and familiar, but I can't get my body to work right. My legs are instantly limp beneath me, and the room is getting dark fast. I am reminded of just after the first Games, being pulled into the hovercraft and into surgery for my leg before I can't think at all, and the world goes black.

When I wake up next, the room is empty, save for a sleeping man who is slumped over in a chair in the corner. It takes a few more moments before it comes back to me again, and I remember that this man is Haymitch.

Remembering what happened last…last _time_, I decide, because I don't know how long it's been since I was last conscious, I sit back and try to calm down. I have to be patient or there's no way they'll tell me anything.

First, I study Haymitch for a while in an effort to distract myself. He looks tired, dead tired. His clothes are wrinkled and a far cry from the ones I saw him in back in the Capitol. But these things are normal for him; the only surprising thing now is that he's _sober._

Wonder why that is.

Can't mean anything good, that's all I know.

My mind starts to wander off, and I let it. I'm exhausted even though I've slept for quite a while. This I know because of the deep stiffness in my bones that comes only from a long sleep.

But then a nurse bustles in, drawing my still-foggy mind back to the present. She moves towards Haymitch, her intention to wake up him clear. Somehow I remember that this isn't a good idea, so I open my mouth to say something.

"Might not want to do that if I were you," I croak, my voice dry.

She whips around, raising an eyebrow. "And why not?"

"Nightmares," I respond, swinging my legs over the side of the bed. She backs away from Haymitch slowly, clearly confused and doubtful. Oh well.

I lean over and open the door to what must be a bathroom before slamming it shut in one quick motion.

Haymitch jumps out of his chair, on his feet in one motion. He seems to have conjured a knife out of thin air—or out of his jacket pocket.

The nurse jumps back, takes an alarmed look at the two of us standing across the room from each other, and nearly runs out of the room, shutting the door behind her.

Haymitch watches her reaction carelessly before cracking a small smile at my impassive face.

"What happened to her? Where is she? Is she…_dead_?" I can't seem to hold the questions in any longer; they've been dying to get out, to get answered.

Haymitch looks at me with pity in his eyes and shakes his head slowly before answering.

"When the time came, only one of you could be saved. They decided to take you rather than her. The Capitol picked her up. We don't know if she's alive or not."

I let that sink in for a moment, and suddenly I want the darkness again.

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	3. Screams

Peeta's POV:

I can feel the air moving in out of my lungs, quickly, way too quickly. Suddenly I'm gasping for air, because _she's not here._

How could I have let this happen?

I promised myself that I would keep her safe. But I'm here, and she's not, and God only knows what they've done to her thus far.

I had a deal. I had a deal with Haymitch. He was going to keep her safe, he swore he would. Instantly, anger flares up, and I'm two steps closer to him.

"We had a deal!" I'm screaming, and I can't help it. "You swore you would keep her safe! You promised! And you let them take me instead of her! How could you?!"

Haymitch closes his eyes, his face tense. When he finally speaks, his voice is quiet, too quiet.

"Our deal was off. I kept her safe in the first Games, just like you said."

"Oh, and you thought that I would be just fine if you _left her there?!_"

I'm getting louder and louder, and somehow I know that I shouldn't be doing this, that I should be remaining calm, but I honestly _can't_.

"Her and I had a deal. I saved her in the first Games, she made me swore to save you the next time."

"Oh no…" I trail off, realizing that I should have thought of that one.

She was exactly the kind of person who would do something like that.

Katniss's POV:

After an immeasurable amount of time, the men with the guns return to my small white room. My mind has been swirling ever since the injection.

I had been happy to be here in place of Peeta, because it meant he was safe. But he was also the reason I was here.

He had pushed me away.

He had let them take me.

It was, I suppose, exactly what I deserved. I had twisted his apparently genuine feelings for me into a relationship that both saved our lives and broke his heart. He must have gotten tired of being strung along, tired of being "in love" just for show.

He must have gotten tired of me.

I suppose I saw it coming, I really did. But that's outright betrayal, what he did. They could've saved us both, I bet. If he hadn't left me out to dry.

The men in white suits nudge me with the metal gun barrels, interrupting my thoughts and prodding me forwards, down the hall in the opposite direction than the last time.

We walk for a long time, taking an elevator to go up—how far, I don't know. What I do know, is that eventually, I'm lead into another room, but this one is far different from the room with the table.

And far worse.

The room is a lavish office, screaming 'over the top' in every possible way. But the most prominent features of the room are the most horrifying: the unbearable scent of roses, and the president of Panem, sitting with his red lips pulled away from shockingly white teeth.

All but one of the men stay outside the door, standing guard, I assume. But one follows me in, gesturing towards a seat across from Snow.

I've been here before, when he told me that I was meant to be the face of a Rebellion-in-the-making, and that he intended to use me for the opposite purpose.

To break down the Rebellion, rather than build it up.

"Hello Miss Everdeen," he practically hisses, his voice sending shivers down my spine. "How are you finding your accommodations?"

Either I have nothing left in me to answer, or it's just a small act of defiance on my part, but I remain silent. The little pride that has stayed with me stubbornly decides it's the latter.

"Feeling quiet, are you?" His voice is low and threatening, and his words prompt the guard that had entered the room to press the cool metal gun against my temple. My breath quickens; even after all I've been through here, my body still fights to survive.

My body will keep itself alive even when all the fight has gone out of me.

"Now I'm going to ask again, Miss Everdeen. How are you finding your accommodations?"

I can't look him in the eyes, so my gaze is focused on the floor to my right when I answer.

"Wonderful, thank you." My voice is sharp and biting, sarcastic in every possible way. This could be taped and sent off somewhere, broadcast to the masses, so I can't give them anything to work with.

"Lovely. Now, is there anything else you'd like to tell us?"

I play dumb.

"About what?"

"About this little uprising, you stupid girl. Which will fail, of course. But it's best that we put out that little fire early on, before it burns any more people."

He has refused to refer to the rebellion as such, always calling it an uprising or protest. He's scared, even if he won't admit it. I had known that things were changing when I had entered the second Games. But I never would have guessed at a rebellion.

But Snow was convinced that I had been the leader of this rebellion in some way, and had refused to believe my surprisingly true words that I had known nothing. It made sense that he thought I was lying; after all, since when does the very face of an organization know nothing about its existence?

I had nothing to tell him, and even if I did, I wouldn't be stupid enough to relay information to him. I have no idea how many people are involved at this point, or how many lives I would endanger by saying anything at all.

So I maintained my silent streak.

"I don't know anything."

"We've been_ over _this. I'm no idiot, Miss Everdeen, and neither are you. You and I both know that there's more information that you won't give us. But you ought to know that you won't just be causing yourself pain this time."

Panic floods through me…I know they have Annie here, but who else? There must be others, I've heard more than the screams of just her.

It's clear that he catches the fear flash across my eyes, as he smirks at me.

He reaches for a remote, turning on the television in the corner of the room. It shows a video of Johanna, dangling above a pool of water, suspended by wires that cut into her arms just slightly.

She's swearing, spewing every profanity I've ever heard, and possibly a few more as well. When there's no response, she sets her gaze straight ahead, incredibly still.

"One last time. Anything you'd like to tell us?"

I've already connected the dots: tell us something, or something horrible happens to Johanna.

I weigh my options, but Snow apparently decides that too much time has passed. He presses a button, and Johanna is dropped into the pool, yanked back up, and then a strange buzz comes from the screen.

That's when her screams erupt from the television.

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